However this may be, Pizarro listened to his
application with singular contentment, for he saw in this new
scion of the true royal stock, a more effectual instrument for
his purposes than he could have found in the family of Quito,
with whom the Peruvians had but little sympathy. He received the
young man, therefore, with great cordiality, and did not hesitate
to assure him that he had been sent into the country by his
master, the Castilian sovereign, in order to vindicate the claims
of Huascar to the crown, and to punish the usurpation of his
rival. *26
[Footnote 26: Ped. Sancho, Rel., ap. Ramusio, tom. III. fol. 406.
- Pedro Pizarro, Descub. y Conq., Ms.]
Taking with him the Indian prince, Pizarro now resumed his march.
It was interrupted for a few hours by a party of the natives, who
lay in wait for him in the neighbouring sierra. A sharp skirmish
ensued, in which the Indians behaved with great spirit, and
inflicted some little injury on the Spaniards; but the latter, at
length, shaking them off, made good their passage through the
defile, and the enemy did not care to follow them into the open
country.
It was late in the afternoon when the Conquerors came in sight of
Cuzco. *27 The descending sun was streaming his broad rays full
on the imperial city, where many an altar was dedicated to his
worship. The low ranges of buildings, showing in his beams like
so many lines of silvery light, filled up the bosom of the valley
and the lower slopes of the mountains, whose shadowy forms hung
darkly over the fair city, as if to shield it from the menaced
profanation.
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